Green Coffee’s Oxygen Dilemma: Friend or Foe?
Green coffee beans – alive and breathing? It’s true! Coffee also needs oxygen to breathe, to become plump and flavorful. However, the relationship between oxygen and green coffee does not stop there. Oxygen can also cause coffee beans to lose their appeal and become old, stale, and damaged. Why so? Did you know about Green Coffee’s Oxygen Dilemma? Explore with XLIII Coffee!
Green coffee beans need oxygen to live
Almost every organism on Earth requires oxygen to sustain life. The same goes for coffee. It needs oxygen to breathe, grow, and create coffee cherries. When removing branches and going through pulping and drying and drying steps, green coffee beans also need oxygen. According to Professor Borém at the Federal University of Lavras (UFLA), green coffee beans consist of plant cells and are 11% water. This causes anhydrobiosis, also known as suspended animation, to occur inside the seeds. To put it more simply, green coffee beans are still a living organism and they need oxygen to maintain metabolic activity and life.
Oxygen can affect the quality of green coffee beans
Oxygen helps coffee maintain life and keep the freshness of the beans. However, oxygen is also the cause of coffee losing its flavor and aroma. The reason may be that, during metabolism, oxygen promotes substances to grow and react with each other, changing the chemical composition of the grain. When cells breathe, they produce energy. They also cause nutrients (especially glucose molecules) to be broken down into water, producing carbon dioxide and ATP (the main molecule to store and transmit energy in cells). This can change the flavor and damage the coffee. You can see the deterioration if you leave green coffee beans outside for many days. The outer parts of coffee cells contain a lot of oil and the beans quickly develop a strange odor, become rancid, and decompose, reducing quality and value. For example, in Professor Borém’s research, oxygen caused green coffee beans stored in paper bags to lose 10 points in just 12 months.
Green coffee beans at XLIII Coffee
How to protect green coffee beans from oxygen?
To protect green coffee from oxidation, manufacturers need to choose appropriate packaging and storage methods, said Juan Vargas, Quality Manager at Fazendas Klem in Matas de Minas. The environment and storage conditions should be properly set up to limit the impact of oxygen on coffee. Storage facilities should be cleaned and humidity monitored regularly. Packaging also needs to choose materials with high durability, waterproofing, and moisture resistance. The coffee must be as isolated as possible from external factors.
XLIII Coffee green coffee beans are stored in GrainPro bags and in a suitable environment
Oxygen helps keep green coffee fresh and flavorful, but it is also the factor that causes it to lose its value. Therefore, for coffee to remain as fresh as when it was on the drying rack at the farm, manufacturers and roasters must make efforts to invest in preservation measures. At XLIII Coffee, coffee is always preserved in optimal conditions during transportation to the warehouse. The packaging also uses recyclable and biodegradable Grainpro bags to help keep the coffee at its highest quality while protecting the environment. If you want to experience specialty coffee beans, come visit XLIII Coffee!
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